SLV Short Interest Increases to 26.57 Million Ounces

A quick review of Shortsqueeze.com indicates that the SLV's short interest increased by 6.71%, or 1,670,600 shares (ounces) in the past week!  Even more astonishing, the SLV has reportedly had over 3 million ounces of silver withdrawn since the beginning of January- likely deposited directly into COMEX vaults.

Ishares Silver Trust	$ 32.96
SLV	0.53

Daily Short Sale Volume - NEW	view
Short Interest (Shares Short)	26,568,400
Days To Cover (Short Interest Ratio)	1.5
Short Percent of Float	view
Naked Short Selling List - NEW	view
Short Interest - Prior	24,897,800
Short % Increase / Decrease	6.71

At 26.57 million, the short interest in the SLV is a whopping 8.7% of the entire 305 million shares of SLV!  As Ted Butler has long argued, such an extreme naked short position of the SLV is pure manipulation aimed at preventing the SLV from holding 26.57 million ounces of silver that would otherwise be required to be held by the fund.  27 million ounces of silver is almost an entire year's US production!  Don't expect Blackrock, the CFTC, or the SEC to do anything about this anytime soon however.  In fact, if anything- expect the cartel's manipulation of silver via the SLV to only intensify as the COMEX fades into irrelevance.